Mama Roma
Sir: In her review of Durrell's 'translation' of Royidis's Pope Joan (30 May), Vivien Ashton is right to wonder how much is Durrell and how much Royidis. As reference to Royidis's own text would show, the answer is: mostly Durrell. It is ironic that she 'is in no doubt that the honours must go to Royidis himself', since the latter had in fact heavily plagiarised from the De papa foemina of Friedrich Spanheim the Youn ger (1632-1701). But even here the honours have gone astray: Aghis Tselalis, who wrote his Istoria tis Papissas loannas (Athens 1963) to show how much Royidis owed to Spanheim, wrongly identified him as the Baron Ezekiel De Spanheim. Like Durrell perhaps, Tselalis was relying on a French translation — one which unfortunately omitted the author's forename.
But although injustice has been done to Spanheim, his attempt to reinstate the belief that Pope Joan had really existed was none the less bad history. His younger contemporary, the philosopher Leibniz, had already written a careful expose of the legend (Flores sparse in tumulum Johannae Papissae), but could not find a publisher for it. Perhaps Leibniz's sour comment on Spanheim's book is still apposite: that publishers were more interested in sales than in soundness of scholarship (Philosophischen Schriften , ed. Gerhardt. Vol. II, p. 369).
George MacDonald Ross Department of Philosophy, University of Leeds
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